STEVE LOMAS joked that chairman Steven Brown could have made a fast buck when the bookies tipped him for the sack two months ago.

But now it looks like the Saints boss is a wise investment for the future after leading the Perth Men to second in the SPL with a record-equalling fifth consecutive win.

Lomas can afford to laugh at the memory of being made the favourite to be the first SPL boss to be sacked after a winless start to the season on top of the five games they lost at the end of the last campaign.

But since grabbing a stunning home win over Celtic, Lomas’ side have not looked back and now he can take his place in the club’s record books beside legendary boss Willie Ormond, who last pieced together such a proud run in 1971.

Lomas grinned: “The bookies have their job to do and I don’t know whether our chairman had a good punt on it! He’s looking to get a bit of money in and maybe thought that was a way of making it.

“I thought that would have been a bit harsh after getting St Johnstone into the top six and Europe.

“I’m delighted with five wins out of five but we know it should have been more convincing, with the amount of chances we had we should have coasted home and you are always fearful at 1-0 of being punished for not killing teams off.

“We’ve probably had a bit of luck that we haven’t had any more injuries because we still only had 14 seniors fit today.”

Killie boss Kenny Shiels admits his side were frequently caught short in the second half as they pushed players forward in search of an equaliser – but he had a pop at linesman Stewart MacMillan for not flagging offside when Saints repeatedly broke clear.

Shiels said: “The fact that the linesman forgot to bring out his flag at half-time had a big influence on the chances St Johnstone had.

“We were playing two at the back and chasing the game so almost all of their chances came when we were trying to recover an equaliser.”